


Deckhands

by kissingandcrying (orphan_account)



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: F/F, F/M, M/M, Pirate!AU, age divergence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-31
Updated: 2017-06-18
Packaged: 2018-11-07 03:33:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,137
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11050452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/kissingandcrying
Summary: With her arms dangled over the rail, Sasha had made herself quite comfortable. She was sitting on the weather deck, watching as Ymir and Jean mopped up errant fish guts down on the crew deck. There were two other visitors sitting near them; Christa, who had followed Ymir up to keep her company but had ended up falling asleep on an old pile of wooden boxes, and  Eren who had followed Christa to the deck because he was bored and didn’t want to be heckled into playing the fiddle in the cabins for the rest of their crew.“Well, look. Her dad’s  gotta have someone step in when he retires,” Jean huffed. “Who else is gonna take the ship when he decides to call it quits?”“That’s not how any of this works,” Ymir grumbled.- A Springles-centric piece with a lot of side pairings. Basically.-





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I'll add warnings as they spring up! They're all in their 20's for this particular piece.

Sasha had been at sea for the better part of twenty years and yet somehow, she still hadn’t gotten used to the motion of the ship on the waves.

Motion sickness wasn’t the worst ailment for sea scavengers. Sasha kept herself on the deck with a plastic bag in her pocket and never actually used it. Still, the irony of piracy when one had severe motion sickness wasn’t lost on any of the crew - especially not when they had a person like Ymir there to remind them every single day.

“I’ve never heard of a swashbuckler with motion sickness, that’s all I’m saying.”

“I’m not a swashbuckler,” Sasha called immediately. She was the captain’s daughter. Her knowledge about ships and adventure were limited to bedtime stories and the occasional experience. She’d never even seen a successful raid before in her life, so what did she know about buccaneering, anyway?

She was here because a winter at sea was warmer than a winter on land, and Sasha was a sensitive soul.

With her arms dangled over the rail, Sasha had made herself quite comfortable. She was sitting on the weather deck, watching as Ymir and Jean mopped up errant fish guts down on the crew deck. There were two other visitors sitting near them; Christa, who had followed Ymir up to keep her company but had ended up falling asleep on an old pile of wooden boxes, and  Eren who had followed _Christa_ to the deck because he was bored and didn’t want to be heckled into playing the fiddle in the cabins for the rest of their crew.

“Well, look. Her dad’s gotta have someone step in when he retires,” Jean huffed. “Who else is gonna take the ship when he decides to call it quits?”

“That’s not how any of this works,” Ymir grumbled.

“Yeah. And I don’t know how to steer a ship, anyway, so giving this one to me would be a mistake...” Sasha chimed in. She wasn’t coordinated enough to pirate anything, let alone a product she didn’t like. She’d never used tobacco and the only pipe she’d seen was the one that dangled out of her father’s mouth when he hit the deck. It was pointless to hand a girl like Sasha a legacy like pirating tobacco.

“Hence why you’re sitting up on the weather deck,” Ymir grunted, nudging fish innards with the end of her broom. She pushed them in Jean’s direction and he made a disgusted face before dancing out of her way so that she could scoop them over the edge of the ship.

Sasha had learned very young that the life of a pirate wasn’t necessarily the most fulfilling. She was old enough to drink but hated the taste of alcohol. She was old enough to smoke, but hated the stale smell it left on her clothes. Between stargazing on the deck at night with the four valiant same-agers who were stuck on this ship with her, there wasn’t a whole lot to do. It was seriously laying in wait of a ship that had a product her father wanted, or dancing around on the deck with Eren, Ymir, Jean, and Christa, praying that said ships weren’t so far and few between.

The sun was setting and the temperature had dropped by the time Ymir and Jean dragged their tools back to a dark corner of the deck. The waves were stronger than they’d been earlier and Sasha groaned, holding onto her stomach as it twisted itself into knots.

“You hanging in there?” Jean called to her. He was already making his way to the stairs of the weather deck - shirtless, with a scarf tied off around his head. He looked absolutely ridiculous.

Evenings on _The Sina_ were quiet. Seldom did the crew get into any looting after nightfall, and ships seemed to pass them often once the sun had set. Sasha had always assumed that it was because of her father’s unwillingness to risk the health and safety of his own vessel over a crate of tobacco and pickled vegetables, but the truth was much more likely that none of them had energy to defend their piracy when late evening set in.  

Looking down the deck of the ship, Sasha watched as Ymir crawled right up onto the boxes and slipped her way between Eren and Christa, like a tall, skinny buffer.

“You should talk to your dad. Find out our next stop,” Jean said as he sat down beside her. “Is there anywhere you actually wanna go?”

As much as her father loved her, Papa Blouse was never going to let Sasha decide where to go. She hadn’t thought about places she wanted to travel because honestly, anywhere that wasn’t frigid and covered with snow was an improvement from where she’d been. She sighed and leaned further forward onto the rail.  

“Somewhere warm, maybe.”

“No specific place in mind? Oh, come on potato girl. You can do better than that,” Jean laughed. He leaned forward onto the railing too and then smiled. “I bet Ymir would _pay you_ to put in a good word and get us somewhere warm. Thirty hands on this ship and the biggest ones belong to you - you’re the only one who can convince your dad to take us somewhere nice for once.”

That sounded nice.

Sasha wouldn’t have weighed her influence that heavily, but she could understand Jean’s restless pleas to go somewhere warm. Honestly - if she hadn’t been born a pirate’s daughter, she’d have set her sights on a nice, toasty place to stay, spending her adulthood with her feet in the water and her head in the sand.  She wanted the same for her crew mates, too. An easy life with the sun always shining and two feet on land.

She should be so lucky, because even if it was out of her reach, it sure sounded nice.

 

* * *

 

It’s not as if the Crew’s cabin was quiet at night, but seldom did Sasha find herself popping awake because of noise-related issues.

It must’ve been early, early morning when the sound of a whip cracking startled Sasha awake. They'd all gone to bed hours ago and the cabin was dark. There weren't any candles that hadn't been blown out (it was far too dangerous to keep those alight at night), but Sasha could hear the quick breathing of her bunk mate beneath her and so she knew she hadn’t just dreamed it. Some really loud, foreign sound had just woken her up.

“...Christa?” Sasha called out nervously.

The sharp sound cracked again and Sasha shot up out of her bed, looking around wildly, just as Christa yelped, “What was that? Ymir!”

There was a shuffling noise, and then Ymir croaked, “Isn’t it too early for this?”

“Did you hear that?” Sasha hissed. She threw her legs over the edge of her bed and jumped down, running to their cabin door and throwing it open. The wood groaned on it’s hinges as the thudding of a visitor approached, and before Sasha could step out into the hallway, Eren’s face appeared, illuminated by candlelight.

Sasha dreaded moments like these. They made her want to close the door and hide herself beneath her large, wool comforter - but she knew better than to leave the rest of the crew with a problem when she was the captain’s daughter. It was her duty to crawl up on deck with the rest of them and defend the ship.

“What’s happening?” Sasha asked. She had a feeling  in the pit of her stomach that it was something serious.

“We’ve got visitors. They’re on board,” Eren hissed. His face was flushed and he looked terrified. Sasha reached out and grabbed his hand, and then tugged him into their cabin room with them, quietly closing the door. “They got Jean.”

Sasha had weaponry hidden around the room. Beneath one set of bunks was a bayonet that she’d never used, and in her clothing cupboard was a blunderbuss. She yanked both of them from their hiding spots and took them to where Ymir, Christa and Eren had gathered in the middle of the room.

“Okay. Who knows how to use these?” She asked, wiggling the bayonet around.

Ymir took it from her with a whispered, “give it here” and began to check the gun for ammo. It took the girl two seconds to see that it hadn’t been loaded, and she looked up at Sasha in something akin to stupified panic. “It’s not _loaded._ ”

Sasha checked her own gun and found it empty.

“How can you have weapons without any ammo?” Ymir hissed irritatedly.

“Oh, shhhh!” Christa butt in. She yanked the bayonet from Ymir’s hands and took a closer look at the knife on the end. “What’s wrong with the knife? We can still use it, can’t we?”

“Not against a ship full of tyrants. How do you think _that’ll_ work?”

Oh, god. Sasha had screwed them all over with her incompetence. They were sitting ducks in here, waiting to be found by a the crew of another vessel.

When Sasha was younger, she’d had a dream of being _anywhere_ but at sea. Her father’s maritime hobbies had always dragged on her, and the clarity that she was a shit daughter and even shittier pirate had never been as clear as it was now - with two guns, zero ammo, and a room full of friends who were in danger of being hurt.

God, what she’d have given to be born and raised on land.

“We can’t just sit here. We have to go up there and help,” Ymir said. Beside her, Christa was chewing nervously on her lip - she’d somehow ended up holding the sole candle between them, having returned the bayonet back to Ymir. It was the only weapon they had. “Christa, you stay here.”

“What, and starve to death when you're all whisked away at sea? I don't think so," and when Ymir opened her mouth to argue, Christa hissed, _"_ _I’m not staying here, Ymir, so if you have something along those lines to say, please don't.”_

Sasha opened her mouth to hush both of them, but didn’t get as far as parting her lips before someone kicked their entire weight against her cabin door. On a long list of mistakes she’d made in her years as a deckhand, she’d also forgotten to lock the door, and it opened easily under the pressure of someone pushing against it.

Christa screamed and Ymir pushed her backwards, stepping in front of her and raising the weapon. Sasha tripped sideways, stepping on wax from Christa’s candle with her bare feet and scalding her skin. Eren startled, but then picked up the empty gun that Sasha had dropped in her haste to move out of the way, waving it wildly at the whoever was accosting them (and what he was going to do with it, she had no idea).

The man that walked in was middle-aged, blonde, and had the body of a god.

Sasha opened her mouth to scream, but found her voice caught in her throat while her brain struggled to catch up to what she was seeing. Beside her, Eren mumbled, ‘what’ and practically lowered whatever weapon he was going to make of the empty blunderbuss. Ymir and Christa both went stock still. Together, they probably all looked like a band of idiots. What the hell were they doing on a ship, again? Not swashbuckling, that's for sure.

The stranger said to them, “Now we can make this easy, or you can try to stab me with that bayonet. Either way, you’re all coming with me.”

The stranger’s words seemed to kickstart Ymir’s ignorant side. She jerked the weapon in the man’s direction and said, “Don’t come over here unless you want this up your ass.”

To be honest, Sasha had no plans to go head to head with a man that looked capable of snapping her in half. Embarrassingly enough, she noticed her eyes roaming his body, taking in his strong facial features, looking at the way he stood confidently in the doorway, and her cheeks flushed. Maybe being held hostage wasn’t so bad if the man that kept her looked like he’d climbed down from Mount Olympus.

“We’re not coming with you,” Eren said clearly.

“Willingly,” The man corrected politely. “If I have to send one of my deckhands down here - you won’t be happy about it. It’s better to come up with your arms raised and bite the bullet.”

For once, it would have been nice if her father’s decision to drag her out on his vessel wasn’t biting her in the ass. Sasha sighed and encouraged Eren to drop his weapon. She knew better then to ask Ymir to comply, but Sasha considered the fact that a rivalry ship had managed to get below deck in the first place, and it wasn’t looking good. Whoever had come onto their ship had already infiltrated it.

“You speak English, right? He said we’re not going,” Ymir growled.

“As you wish,” The man said.

He stepped back and unclasped his pocket, reaching into it quickly.

Sasha screamed, “ _No!_ No, we’ll come!”

God knows what the man was wrapping his gorgeous little fingers around, but Sasha didn’t want it out of his pocket. Her mind flashed images of dangerous weapons, smoke bombs, anything that might lay them out, unconscious, in which case they’d be dragged up to the deck and cuffed anyway. It was better to comply while they still had their wits about them.

“We’re not -” Ymir started.

“ _Ymir_ ,” Sasha hissed anxiously.

Beside her, Eren had gone quiet. He was usually a step behind Ymir, ready to scream and jump at anything that moved, but the situation was dire from all aspects. They hadn’t had time to prepare and even if they had, their backup was currently on deck, their guns didn’t have any ammo, and the man they were facing off against had a mystery object in his pocket that he was willing to use. No matter what, they weren’t getting out of this situation without their hands tied behind their backs.

“We have to go,” Sasha said dejectedly.

Her voice was low, but she reached up and quickly retied her sleep-mussed ponytail to get the annoying, errant hairs out of her face, and then she lifted her shoulders proudly and took the first step towards capture.

 

* * *

 

 

Jean was a bit of an idiot. He was the hardheaded, heavy handed, and unfiltered version of Christa; he meant well but hadn’t quite worked out how to turn those facets of his personality into strengths that could get them out of being prisoners. Instead of helping them out of the cuffs that kept their hands fastened tightly in front of their bodies, Jean seemed to be _tightening_ them with every profanity that slipped from between his lips.

The moon hadn’t even sunk to the horizon when Sasha was walked calmly to the ladder that had been tossed up onto their deck. She peered over the ledge and there was a rowboat floating beneath them that she assumed she’d be climbing down onto. It was too dark and too far away to see clearly, but there seemed to be a member of crew already sitting down on the wooden seating of the vessel, waiting for them to descend.

Not a mile from the rowboat was a larger, more sturdy ship. It was so much bigger than their own.

Behind her, Jean muttered out vague threats and struggled against his hold.

“Wait until these cuffs are off,” Jean threatened, “I’m gonna kick your asses!”

Sasha took a deep breath and turned nervously in her abductor’s hold, saying, “Where is everyone else? Where is my dad?”

“You’ll see him shortly.”

“He’s not hurt?”

“No,” The man said. “We’re not here to maim your crew. We’re here to collect something from your vessel.”

“Then why do we have to go with you?”

“Recompense,” The man said simply.

One swift look across the deck showed a gaggle of young men with guns who were peeking through crates, descending below deck to plunder the cabins, and otherwise transporting the rest of Sasha’s crewmates to the stand behind her in preparation for the climb down. So far they’d grabbed Eren, Ymir, Christa, Jean, and two other deckhands named Thomas and Mike. Only Jean seemed to be holding onto the notion that aggression would get them out of the situation. Sasha sighed and then turned back towards the ladder.

“I don’t like the water,” She admitted quietly. “I can’t climb down.”

“Sounds unlikely for a captain’s daughter.”

“But it’s _true_. I’m a terrible sailor.”

The man raised his thick, blonde eyebrows at her and said, “You’re not just a sailor. You’re a pirate.”

“I’m not much of one. I’m being walked out to sea in chains,” She mumbled.

“You’re being walked to a smaller boat in chains. Consider yourself lucky - you’re a pirate whose ship has been found by a merciful crew.”

Sasha took one last meaningful look over the edge of her ship before nervously approaching the grappling hooks of the ladder. She had to be on her knees if she wanted to find her footing on the rung, and with her hands bound so closely together, it wasn’t possible for her to hold both sides of the stringers to keep herself from falling. The rungs were close enough that she could hold herself up with them. She was going to have to _very_ carefully lower herself between steps if she didn’t want to fall.

“Oh my god,” She breathed anxiously.

The first step was a hard catch. She felt around with her foot until it was securely fastened on the wooden step, and then she moved backwards until she could lower her other foot with it, hand already gripping the top rung as tightly as she could.

It wasn’t necessarily a long journey. Ships were big when you had to climb off of them without a ramp - and they felt even bigger when one was a hostage and couldn’t move their hands properly. She took all the time she needed in descending, haunted by the image of losing her grip and falling hard onto the wood of the boat beneath her.

What was harder than finagling her way down a flimsy ladder was finding her balance on the wood of a wobbly rowboat once she’d reached a safe height to climb off of it. Luckily, she was steadied by a strong grip on either side of her hips, with someone’s large hands holding her body until she disembarked safely.

“Thank you,” She said immediately. She was sweating her weight in water and despite tying her hair off before she’d been bound, it was a loose mess again. As she turned to give a more appropriate greeting, she pushed it out of her way and took a good look at the person sharing the space with her.

“You okay?” He asked.

Sasha’s father had once told her stories about meeting men who you knew, immediately, were good hearted, pure souled types of people. The sorts that looked like the sun shone out of their ass. It only took a moment for Sasha to categorize this man as one of them. With a buzz cut that was lined so precisely, eyes wide and hazel, and he wasn’t anywhere near as muscular as the man who had kicked his way into their room and demanded they comply, but he was just as handsome, she felt like maybe she’d stumbled into the wrong boat.

Sasha stuttered twice before giving up and just shutting her mouth.

“Are you hurt?” He tried again.

Sasha self-consciously wound her fingers together in front of her and looked down at her hands.

“No, I’m just… I just… well, you know.”

“Prisoner and all that,” He laughed quietly. “I get it.”

“Yeah.”

“I’m… I’m Connie,” The guy said. “Sorry for grabbing you. I didn’t want you to fall.”

Sasha cleared her throat and wobbled her way to a free seat. Connie, he’d said. Sasha liked that name.

“Well thanks. I’m Sasha.”

“Sasha,” Connie said quietly to himself. Then, more loudly, in a direct mimicry of Sasha’s own thoughts, he said, “I like that name.”

 

* * *

 

Sasha had gone her whole life believing that if she were ever captured at sea, she’d have been better off dead. Floating in a small rowboat away from _The Sina_ to a foreign vessel, she wondered if it was true.

Really, she wasn’t going to have to wait so long to find out.


	2. Chapter 2

Sasha had learned to take comfort in water many, many years ago.

From the stories Papa Blouse would tell, Sasha’s mother would carry her out to the water and then sit where it was shallow, and slowly dip Sasha in until she kicked her legs hard enough to make herself float. He explained that it was her mother’s way of introducing them to each other, the water and her, so that when she was floating alone at sea, just looking out to the water that stretched up against the horizon would console her.

Sasha wondered if solace was what she was feeling as she looked out to the sea around her from the new vessel. Honestly, it felt more like resignation. But there was something to be said for the way her emotions changed whenever she really, _really_ looked at the expanse of water around her, crawling it’s way up to the line of the horizon, looking every bit as large and revering as it ever did.

She might as well thank her mother for that, even if the stories weren’t true.

 

* * *

 

 

“Okay. Can I be the first one to mention how fucking clean this ship is?”

It was the first thing any of them had said since being dragged down to the hold, and it was strangely fitting. If Ymir hadn’t asked the question, certainly somebody else would have mentioned it.

“Yeah, this is weird,” Jean chimed in. “I don’t even see any cobwebs.”

As if to make a point, Jean took a slow walk around their cell and raised his arm, dragging his finger along one of the wooden walls, showing how clean his finger was afterwards by sticking it in everyone’s faces.

The hold was large. It was two platforms below the main deck, but was well-lit and nicely furnished. Other than the iron bars keeping them to a dedicated area, Sasha couldn’t believe that they were truly prisoners. They each had their own cold mug of water. She could smell pine. There were _rugs_ on the floor. Nothing at all about this environment implied that she was being detained.

“It’s spacious…” Christa said, turning to Ymir (who had crawled right up next to her), and shooting her an unimpressed look.

The dirtiest part of the vessel had been the ladder she’d climbed to the deck on when she’d first arrived, and even _that_ had been stripped of mud and grime. The wood had been shining beneath her hands as she hauled herself up between rungs, and cleaner yet had been the deck, and the men and women who were standing at the top of the ladder with nice, pressed clothing, waiting for them to stumble their way on board.

Sasha had looked up from her position on her hands and knees and just blinked stupidly when someone said, “welcome”. The man before her had been tall and had short, black hair. He was quite skinny but he had looked like a pleasant crew member, so when he’d reached out to help her up off of the floor, she’d gladly taken his proffered hand and used it for leverage. Her own hands had been still bound tightly together, but she’d managed to stand up and he’d said, “It’s good to have you aboard.”

Not a second later, a smaller, blonde woman had responded shortly, “We talked about this,” and grabbed Sasha by her arm, yanking her away from the ladder. “This isn’t a hotel, Hoover. Take ‘em straight down.”

But honestly, Sasha could see why the man had needed to be reminded. This ship’s hold was cleaner and better maintained than the entire crew cabin of The Sina _._ With a ship like this, differentiating between a hotel and a prison was a necessity.

Sasha sighed and slipped her way further down the wall, going from sitting on her ass to laying on her back. She kicked one leg over the other and made herself comfortable.

“How long  do you think it'll be until they come down and see what we’re up to?”

“We should be up to something,” Eren muttered. “Like, I don’t know, trying to escape.”

“Or something like that,” Ymir snorted.

"We shouldn't put ourselves in danger when we're not distressed," Mike said calmly. He didn't seem to find an issue with being prisoner. In fact, he was very quickly making himself at home.

“Right. Let’s not test their patience.” Jean butted in. He’d gone down onto his hands and knees and was messing with the fur of the rug. He didn’t look pressed to complain about his lodgings either, and was smiling when he continued, “We don’t know who we’re working against, but I can tell you that anyone who keeps a ship this clean is not to be messed with, that’s for damn sure.”

So it seemed that none of them were overly concerned about their current predicament, which was a bit bizarre.

“Ymir used to know a really neat person,” Christa laughed. “Remember that guy you told me about?”

“Ah. Yeah. Levi, I think his name was,” Ymir said. “Did I ever tell you guys about him?”

Mike made a short noise in the back of his throat and Thomas, who hadn't said anything up until now, whacked him in the arm.

Sasha's stomach rolled and she wrapped her arms around herself because now that the adrenaline was wearing off, her upset tummy was rebooting itself. The smell of seawater wasn’t strong enough to cover the scent of pine, but like an insistent alarm, Sasha could still smell it and little by little, her senses opened back up to her circumstances and she could feel the boat rocking back and forth, back and forth, beneath her. There was a dull pain that was starting to shoot from the base of her skull. It was almost immediate. The symptoms began to spring up one after another and she realized that with the immediate distress out of the way, her body was slowly reverting back to it's same old antics.

Poor Sasha. The captain’s daughter. The seasick dame.

If Sasha was lucky, she’d fall asleep before the migraine _and_ the nausea set in.

In an effort to try and rush the process along, she closed her eyes and listened to the deep, relaxing hum of Ymir’s voice, trying her hardest to go to sleep.

* * *

 

Sasha hadn’t necessarily had a list of expectations for being held captive, but If she’d had them, they’d likely have been shattered the second she stepped foot into the regally decorated hold. Still, when she was awoken from her sleep by a soft set of hands lightly touching her jaw, and then a comforting voice saying, “Don’t be startled,” It was all the more obvious that the entire situation was an anomaly.

As if it was a cue, Sasha sprung awake, startled.

“Oh my _god_ ,” She hissed, smacking the hands away from her face. It only took a second for her brain to process who she was seeing. “C-colin?”

“Connie,” The boy corrected.

“I’m sorry,” Sasha said. Her cheeks immediately went warm and she _knew_ she was blushing. Her only hope was that the candles had dimmed enough for her embarrassment to be hidden. How could she have gotten his name wrong? “I, uh…”

“You just woke up,” Connie said. “Don’t worry. It was close enough.”

It was strange having a member of the opposite crew so casually in their holding cell. Sasha peeked around Connie’s body to see what the others were doing only to find them all fast asleep; Ymir and Christa had curled up in a corner together, Jean was dangled over Eren’s back cradling his empty jug of water and snoring, Mike and Thomas were sitting up against the wall, but their heads were dangled low to their chests from the weight of gravity in their sleep. Huh. Absolutely none of them had a care in the world.

“I didn’t wanna wake you up, but the captain needs to speak to you.”

“Me?” Sasha asked. She looked back to him. “Why?”

“I don’t know.” Connie admitted. “But I can walk you up there so that you can find out. He said it wouldn't take long.”

Connie was a difficult person to deny. Sasha had met him a total of two times but it was like magic. With every word that dropped from his mouth, she found herself more and more fascinated by him. It wasn’t just his look - of course she thought that he was handsome, buzz cut and all. It’d been a long time since she’d met another pirate her age that _wasn’t_ a part of her crew and so naturally it was bound to happen. But more than that, his style of expression and his easy manner of speech was drawing her in.

He smiled at her and reached out to help her up, mistaking her silence for nerves. 

“Don’t worry. The captain’s not crazy.”

“What could I do even if he _was_ crazy?” Sasha asked. “I’m a prisoner.”

Behind Connie, Sasha could hear Ymir mumbling in her sleep and wondered how they’d ever made it so long as a crew. They were all completely, completely underwhelming when it came to defending and representing a vessel. They were all lazy, none of them really made for pillaging. That much was clear by how comfortable they’d all made themselves in the hull of someone else’s ship. It was as endearing as it was ridiculous.

Sasha sighed and said, “Okay. Lead the way.”

It wasn’t dark at all as they slipped out of the cell. Connie put the lock back on the iron and said, “Can you see or do I need to hold onto you?”

Oh, god. If she held his hand her palm would end up sweaty. There was no hope of returning from that. She stuttered, “No, no, I - I… I can see.”

“Okay. This way.”

Sasha followed Connie closely. With every step they took, the smell of seawater got stronger until they’d walked the entire length of the ship and then climbed their way upwards. The sun was just rising when she broke the deck. She’d managed to sleep the entire night through in the hold.

Step after step and then deck after deck, as Sasha passed the ratlines and was lead upwards still, she realized just how much larger this ship was than The Sina. Looking out at the sea around her, she felt like she was so high above the water that if she were tossed over the speed alone from falling might break her neck.

This was the kind of ship that benefited from a plank. Nobody would survive the drop.

“What’s the name of this ship?” She asked.

“Uh, it’s called the SS Rose.”

Sasha’s father had seldom shared the names of other ships with her. It wasn’t like there was a rule against mentioning other pillagers and their vessels, but he barely ever did. There was one ship that Sasha had learned to listen out for though, and It wasn’t the SS Rose. She’d only heard about them in passing, but their ship was named MS Maria and hadn’t been seen in long enough that they were more a legend than anything else. Perhaps a scare tactic for the younger generation of sailors - but it worked well enough. Now that she was out of the safety of her own ship it certainly crossed her mind. At least she wasn't in immediate danger. The SS Rose didn't ring a bell. 

The captain’s cabin was on a higher deck. The doors were large and decorated oak, and Connie walked right up to them and confidently turned the handle to let them in.

Sasha had never seen such pristine lodgings before. It almost seemed surreal to be walking into a cabin and forgetting that she was on a ship. The room was beautifully decorated; rather than the basic, boring taper candles that she was used to seeing around, the cabin had elaborate and intricate candelabra to hold them. There were rugs of differing furs on the floor, and large, ornate, taxidermied animals on the walls. Windows were covered with a light fabric that painted the room orange.

When a deep voice said, “I see you’re impressed,” embarrassingly, Sasha was caught blinking stupidly with her mouth wide open. Her father’s cabin had never looked like this. What kind of lie had she been living, in squalor on a small-ish ship when she could have been living like a queen? Maybe being kidnapped was the change she'd been waiting for.

“Uhm… it’s really nice in here.”

Sitting in front of her at the head of a large desk was the same blonde man that had barged his way into their rooms and collected them from their ship. Sasha raised her eyebrows and took an unconscious step backwards.

“Hello, Ms. Blouse.” The man said.

“H-hi… mister.”

The door clicked closed quietly behind her and she flinched.

“Come. Take a seat.” The man said politely, gesturing towards one of the comfortable-looking chairs scattered around his office.

No matter how handsome and confident the man looked, Sasha was still nervous. She hadn’t seen her father in long enough that the concern was starting to creep in. She was between two heavy emotional states: elation and anxiety. The elation was because of every ship she’d ever imagined being held prisoner on, one of this caliber had never come to mind. It was a godsend. But then the anxiety crawled lose because she still had no idea why she was here and what would happen to her as a result. What were beautiful surroundings if you were going to be tortured in them?

“I don’t know much about my father’s business. I don’t think you’ll get much information from me,” Sasha told him honestly. If she could impress upon everyone how shit of a pirate she actually was, maybe they’d cut her some slack. So she was the captain's daughter? Why was the pressure on her to handle tension like this?

“I understand. I’d still like to speak with you.”

Sasha hesitated to go. Connie set a comforting hand on her shoulder and muttered, “He just wants to talk to you. It’s alright,” and Sasha looked over her shoulder. Connie didn’t strike her as a liar. Of all things to gather strength from, the soft smile of a boy she’d just met a few hours ago was certainly the strangest of them. She nodded her head briefly and then went to take a seat.

“I know that this situation may be causing you a bit of anxiety and so I’ll get straight to the point,” The man said as she sat down. “My name is Erwin Smith and I’m going to be responsible for your crew until your father has paid off his debt to my ship.”

Sasha looked down at her lap and took a deep breath.

“He owes you?” She asked. “Did he steal your tobacco?”

“Amongst other things,” Erwin told her. “He owes me quite a bit of money for his excursions.”

Few people had the time and resources to bombard another ship and care for the crew that they found there, so somewhere deep in Sasha’s gut, she’d known this was the case. The fact that none of them had been killed upon arrival meant that there was business here - something that needed to be resolved. Annoyingly enough, Sasha found herself yet again at the mercy of a decision her father had made.

“I’m sorry,” She said. “I wish… I wish he wouldn’t steal things.”

“That’s in a pirate’s nature. It’s his business.”

“Yeah, well, it’s a crap business.” Sasha said.

“I agree.” Erwin said.

Strange for a pirate to denounce his own craft, but there it was.

“And what do you steal?” Sasha asked.

Erwin sat behind his desk with nary a hair out of place. His elbows were pressed comfortably into the wood of his desk and his fingers were laced beneath his chin, and he watched Sasha closely. The room was silent for an awkward and extended couple of minutes.

“I don’t steal anything,” Erwin said. “I’m looking for something. I’m not even sure if it exists, but if it does then I intend to find it.”

“And what's that?”

“Nothing that you can help me with, I assure you.”

It might have been a product. It also might have also been people, or ships, like Sasha’s father. Erwin’s face gave nothing away. Sasha felt uncomfortable asking for more information.

“Your friends,” He said quietly, delving back in. “They’re a feisty group.”

“They seem like that. I mean, Ymir and Eren have a temper. Jean likes free stuff. Mike likes to sniff things. Christa and Thomas… well, they’re… you know. They do their best.”

“Hmm.”

“I’m sure you’ve met my dad before.”

“Thrice.”

“He’s a good person.”

“A good person doesn’t take what isn’t theirs and then try and turn it for profit,” Erwin reminded her softly. “But I’m sure outside of his… morally dubious business pursuits, he might be a good man.”

If this was an effort at diplomacy, Sasha was failing terribly. With a small grunt of anger she looked back down at her hands.

Erwin smiled and leaned back in his seat. “You’re a soft spoken person. I can see that you’re out of your element. I just want to warn you that you’ll be a passenger on this ship for an extended period of time. During that time, I hope that your friends can adopt a kinder disposition. They’ll need it if they want the respect of the crew that runs this ship. I promise you that mouthing off won’t grant you any favors.”

That went without saying. Sasha was well aware that Ymir’s, Eren’s, and Jean’s mouths were a hazard. Maybe she could enlist the buddy system and have all of the reasonable members of crew babysit so that none of them would end up killed.

“I know.” Sasha said quietly.

“Right,” Erwin said. With a brief pause he asked, “Have you eaten?”

Food was something that Sasha would never, ever turn down. Her body ignited from the inside and she felt warm, excited. When she responded, it was almost a feverish scream.

“No! No, I haven’t! We haven’t!”

Erwin seemed startled. He scooted back just a bit in his chair with his thick, furrowed eyebrows. It took a moment for him to come back from the shock. He fixed Sasha with a soft smile and said, “We’ll feed you. I hope sweet potatoes will suffice.”

Sasha would do  _anything_  for sweet potatoes right now. Her stomach felt like it was touching her back.

“The next few days will undoubtedly require a lot of adjustments on both of our parts, but I’m hoping that in the time it takes your father to rectify his mistake, we can become companions enough. Working together will certainly improve our relations. My goal is not to cause you distress while you're with me, but it's going to require effort from both of us to make that a reality.”

Sasha nodded. She was thankful to hear that she wasn't in any immediate danger. She just had to make sure that the others were aware of their new positions here.

Erwin looked over Sasha’s shoulder and waved Connie to him. “Please escort our young Mrs. Blouse back to her crew-mates. I’m sure they’re all still asleep, but we shouldn’t keep her for longer than necessary.”

The conversation had been surprisingly anti-climactic. It was little more than a glorified warning, honestly.

It was such a short conversation that Sasha expected the others to still be asleep when she returned to the hold. Shockingly, though, as Connie walked them back to the lower decks, she heard Jean’s loud and grating voice. The iron bars of the cell door were being rattled loudly and over and over was the simple, “Where the hell is she?!”

So they had woken up.

Connie snorted and looked over his shoulder at Sasha as they descended the stairs. He asked, “You think it’s safe for me to open the door? I don’t want to get beaten up by a guy with an undercut.”

“I was only gone a for ten minutes,” Sasha responded incredulously.

" _Hey, I hear something,_ ” Eren said.

Sasha moved ahead of Connie and went to the cell first. They were all pressed right up against the iron bars looking for her. It was cute. 

“I’m fine!” She said. “Guys, calm down.”

“What the fuck. You’re not just supposed to walk off with them,” Ymir growled irritably. “You have, like, zero self-preservation.”

“ _I know that,”_ Sasha hissed back. “But they’re gonna feed us sweet potatoes.”

“Ooh ~” Christa cooed.

Ymir tsked Christa and Jean said, “You’re a liability when food is involved, do you know that?”

Connie cleared his throat and butted in, “Sorry, but I gotta put her back in the cell. Can you guys stand against the wall?”

“Why the hell would we do that?” Ymir asked tartly. “So you can shove her back in here?”

“Uhm. Yeah. That’s what I just said…” Connie trailed off. “Unless you want her to stay out here and eat sweet potatoes by herself.”

That seemed to give them all pause. Eren looked particularly nervous. He stepped back a little bit and Jean followed suit. There was a small stand off before Jean stomped his way to where Mike and Thomas had set up fort. Mike was quiet and as relaxed as ever, laid out on his back as if he’d just woken up. All he was missing was a piece of wheat to dangle out of his mouth.

Sasha didn’t necessarily want to go back into the holding cell, but she wanted to eat. When Connie unlocked the door, she saw herself into the space with her aggravated companions, excited for their upcoming dinner.

So far, the entire process of becoming a prisoner was underwhelming, but Sasha hadn’t seen sweet potatoes since she was young, so yeah, there were a few perks to her father’s terrible, terrible decisions. Food and friends.

That was about it.


End file.
